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A journal following the history, design, construction and operation of Bernard Kempinski's 1/48th - (O) Scale model railroad depicting the U. S. Military Railroad (USMRR) Aquia-Fredericksburg line in 1863, and other model railroad projects.

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June 17, 2012

Work on the layout has been slow lately thanks to many other distractions. But Gerry emailed me about a work session and thanks to this motivating kick start, we had a mini work session on Saturday. Gerry continued to spike rail at Accokeek Creek, while I started the cargo platforms at Stonemans. Here are some photos of the WIP.

Later Sunday evening, I continued work on the platforms.

After dinner on Saturday, Gerry and I discussed some ideas for an ACW Roadshow. Nothing is definite, but I would like to start working on it in October to be ready for the Atlanta NMRA National show in 2013. We spent a good amount of time looking at Alexandria, especially the waterfront as a potential prototype inspiration. But trying to do it in O Scale will probably be impractical. The area of interest, from the Wilkes St Tunnel to the Hay Wharf to the north is 1200 yards long. That works out to 75 feet in O scale. I'll post more about this later as the planning proceeds. In the meantime, work will continue on the Aquia line as we will be hosting an open house for the ACWRRHS in September. I would like to have the main room pretty much done by then.

The mess before the storm

Laying out the posts and beams for the platforms. The prototype photos show several
different methods of construction, so I mixed them up.

The foreground platform is about 30 inches long. Both the back and front platforms curve to follow the track.I fretted about how to deal with that curve, but in the end it just worked out.

This is about as far as I got when I ran out of decking boards. I'll cut some more and finish the planking job.